Parents of Slain Metallica Fan Thankful for Band’s Continued Support

In 2009, Virginia Tech college student Morgan Harrington was murdered shortly after disappearing from a Metallica concert in Charlottesville. Three-plus years later, the band is still involved with the search for the 20-year-old student's killer and her parents are thankful for the continued support.

Noisecreep reports that the band's latest venture, allowing the title of 'Enter Sandman' to be used on a line of Virginia Tech t-shirts, has resulted in another $40,000 being raised this past fall for the Morgan Harrington medical scholarship fund. That comes after the band chipped in $50,000 of their own money when the fund was initially launched and they also donated $50,000 to the reward in seeking information that would lead to the capture of Harrington's killer. Plus, just last year, the band filmed yet another PSA seeking information in the case.

Morgan's mother, Gil Harrington, said of the band's involvement, "It has been very humbling from the very beginning. Two days after Morgan was abducted, they could have distanced themselves from an ugly occurrence. But James Hetfield called this house to speak to Dan [Harrington], as a father, and asked, 'What can we do?' Three years out, and they are still doing things."

Harrington says Hetfield spoke to the FBI and also generated the first "missing person" poster that went up on their website in hopes of locating her daughter. "It's a visceral response as fathers. They were not liability driven or self-protecting," she adds of their involvement.

At present, between the Harrington family and Metallica, there is $150,000 reward for information leading to the arrest and conviction of Morgan's murderer. For more information on the case and reward, visit this location. To read more of Noisecreep's interview with Gil Harrington's exclusive interview, click here.